A smaller digital garden
Why a few well-tended notes can be more useful than an endless collection.
Collecting is the easy part
An imaginary notebook contains hundreds of saved links and very few original sentences. Each link was interesting once. Together they have become difficult to navigate.
Give an idea a home
Instead of saving another page, write three sentences about one already saved. Explain what it means, where it might help, and what remains uncertain.
A small collection with clear connections can be more useful than a large collection without context. Try a simple structure:
- An observation in your own words
- A connection to another idea
- A question to return to
Return, revise, remove
A garden needs more than planting. Revisit an old note. Change its title. Remove a sentence that no longer helps. The value is in the attention, not the size of the archive.
Thanks for spending a little time here.Back to journal